Artist Books: Past and Present. Talk and Exhibit Tour

Williams College Libraries is hosting a talk about artist books on Monday March 2, 2:00-4:00 p.m., featuring Rutherford Witthus, whose work is displayed in the exhibit “Geograhies: New England Book Work” currently in Sawyer Library, and Robert Volz, Custodian of the Chapin Library.

Mr Witthus will discuss his work as a book artist and give a tour of the exhibit by the New England Guild of Book Workers, which features book artists from New England. Mr Volz will discuss the long and rich history of artist books, and showcase examples from the Chapin Library collection, ranging from 1463 century to modern times.

Event Schedule:
2:00 pm: Introduction by Christine Menard, Head of Research Services and Library Outreach Research
2:10 pm: NEGBW artist, Rutherford Witthus, discusses his work, bookmaking and the Guild.
2:30 pm: Q&A moderated by Kate Barber, WCMA’s Publications Assistant and Guild Member
2:45 pm: Guide walk through of the NEGBW with Rutherford and one of the Chapin librarians
3:15 pm: Discussion of the Chapin collection

This event is co-sponsored by Williams College Libraries and the New England Guild of Book Workers. The exhibit, “Geographies: New England Book Work” will be on display in Sawyer Library until March 30.Exhibit Catalog

One response to “Artist Books: Past and Present. Talk and Exhibit Tour”

This was a wonderful event. Rutherford Witthus gave a lucid tour of the exhibition, with a fascinating, detailed view of his own book, 28 Fort Square, including the history of the concept, how it evolved from his previous curatorial life, and the production decisions made for both the original prototype and the revised structure and design of the edition.

This was followed by an awesome (and I hardly ever use that word) hands-on display of “artists’ books” from the Chapin collection from a 15th century block-book (printed not from moveable type, but blocks with the text and images all cut from the block and hand colored) through today, with stops at Durer, etc., introduced by the learned Custodian of the collection, Robert Volz.